A 100-year-old Sherlock Holmes Film Has Been Discovered

An almost 100-year-old Sherlock Holmes film has been discovered by French film archive, Cinémathèque Française.

According to Variety, the silent film stars American actor William Gillette, and is the only surviving flick in which Gillette plays Holmes on camera. Prior to the 1916 movie, Gillette earned renown for his theatrical portrayal of Holmes during the late 1890s and early 1900s. The iconic deerstalker hat and smoking pipe can also be traced back to Gillette's performance.

As for Cinémathèque Française, the archive exists today to preserve film, and boasts one of the largest film collections in the world. Established in 1936, the Cinémathèque Française was co-founded by Henri Langlois, Georges Franju, and Jean Mitry. The original collection was in part down to the efforts of Langlois, who, during World War II was ordered to destroy his collection by the German Authorities. Not willing to part with his collection, Langlois and several others smuggled a large quantity of films and documents out of an unoccupied France in order to preserve and protect them until the conflict ceased.

The San Francisco Silent Film Festival, in partnership with the Cinematheque, aims to restore the film through digital restoration. Currently, its release is pencilled in for January 2015 in Europe, with a US release in May 2015.

Wesley Copeland is a freelancer news writer, but you probably already guessed that. For more obvious statements, you should probably follow him on Twitter.